Olmert: Core Issues Are On The Annapolis Agenda
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Haaretz
by Barak Ravid - November 5, 2007 - 2:40pm

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert took the stage at the Saban Forum on Sunday evening in Jerusalem, and delivered an impassioned speech promising to seriously pursue current Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts, saying that "all the fundamental questions and substantial problems will be on the table at Annapolis."

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Jerusalem Diary: Monday 5 November
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Bbc News
by Tim Franks - November 5, 2007 - 2:32pm

DIRECTING THE POLICE DIRECTING THE TRAFFIC There may not be many well-paid jobs in the occupied territories. But there are plenty of policemen and security officers. They were on the streets of Nablus in the West Bank the other day, waving furiously at the traffic. They were trying to ensure that the path was clear for Gen Keith Dayton, the US point man in the region, whose job is to help knock the Palestinian security forces into better shape.

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Rice Expects Little From Mideast Trip
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Los Angeles Times
by Ashraf Khalil - November 5, 2007 - 2:28pm

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice returned to Israel on Sunday for the third time in six weeks, seeking to nudge the Israeli and Palestinian sides before an upcoming U.S.-sponsored peace conference. But after a day of meetings with Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Rice acknowledged that her two-day visit was unlikely to get the two sides to agree on the joint pre-conference statement of goals that the U.S. has sought.

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Rice Seeks Mideast Peace Deal While Bush In Office
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Reuters
by Sue Pleming - November 5, 2007 - 2:27pm

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice joined Israeli and Palestinian leaders on Monday in voicing hope they could reach a peace agreement before President George W. Bush leaves office in January 2009. But wrapping up two days of talks in the region, she again gave no date for a U.S.-led conference which all parties have said would serve as a launching pad for statehood negotiations. Rice said only that the meeting, in Annapolis, Maryland, would take place "before the end of the year."

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Restive Nablus Challenges Fatah's Abbas
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Christian Science Monitor
by Joshua Mitnick - November 5, 2007 - 2:25pm

Over the course of the second Palestinian intifada, this city became the West Bank's capital for car thefts, kidnappings, and suicide bombers. Now, with 300 security officers from the Palestinian Authority (PA) freshly deployed around Nablus, the city has become a testing ground for an embattled Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas.

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In Mideast, Rice Pushes Annapolis Talks
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The Washington Post
by Karen Deyoung - November 5, 2007 - 2:23pm

Israel is ready to put "all basic questions, all the substantive problems, all the historical questions" about Palestinian statehood on the table in a U.S.-hosted peace conference later this month in Annapolis, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Sunday. "It is time," Olmert said in an impassioned speech. "All questions are on the agenda. We won't run away from any of them."

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Olmert Backs Mideast Peace Conference
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
by Helene Cooper - November 5, 2007 - 2:19pm

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel issued his strongest and most vocal support yet on Sunday for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s efforts to forge a Middle East peace plan, raising the possibility of making peace with the Palestinians before the conclusion of the Bush administration.

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That Promised Peace Conference
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from The New York Times
(Editorial) November 5, 2007 - 2:18pm

One month before President Bush’s Mideast peace conference — the administration’s first serious effort in six years — it’s still not clear what will be on the agenda or who, beyond the Americans, Israelis and Palestinians, will show up. Even the date is still up in the air.

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The Annapolis Summit
In Print by Ziad Asali - The Washington Times (Opinion) - November 5, 2007 - 1:00am

The skeptics have unassailable arguments: History and a consistent record of failure are on their side. Weak Israeli and Palestinian governments, an American president in the last stretch of his second term, dysfunctional Israeli and Palestinian body politics, and cynical media coverage all dampen any reasonable expectations of success for the Middle East summit in Annapolis.

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Disorder In The Ranks Of Hamas?
ATFP World Press Roundup Article from Miftah
by Caelum Moffatt - (Opinion) November 2, 2007 - 5:10pm

Last Sunday, Hamas government spokesperson, Ghazi Hamad, was alleged to have issued a five page letter in which he criticized and questioned Hamas’ takeover of the Gaza Strip in June. The former editor-in-chief of the Hamas-affiliated weekly Al-Risala has denied the letter’s existence in which he ostensibly declared that the events in June, which resulted in the current duopoly of Palestine, was a “serious strategic mistake that burdened the movement more than it can bear”.

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